


Gifts

by Akamaimom



Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: Christmas Fluff, Domestic Fluff, Established Relationship, F/M, Family, Humor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-26
Updated: 2020-12-26
Packaged: 2021-03-10 21:41:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,926
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28340331
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Akamaimom/pseuds/Akamaimom
Summary: It's Christmas, but someone's missing. Jack's antsy--but not as antsy as his kids. Just a simple little fluffy fic fit for the holiday. Hinted gutter, but not really. Jack/Sam established relationship.
Relationships: Samantha "Sam" Carter/Jack O'Neill
Comments: 17
Kudos: 69





	Gifts

_**Gifts** _

_ A few notes: _

_ This fic literally begged me to get written. I tried to finish it before Christmas Eve, but it just didn’t happen. But at least I’m posting it before Christmas is technically over, right? (At least, in my state. . . ) I’m counting that as a win.  _

_ Before you say “Kids don’t talk that way!”, I just want to assure you that mine do. These conversations--including all but one of the jokes--were inspired by actual conversations I’ve had with my kids. I have six of them, so I have lots of fodder. My two youngest are only a year older than the kids in this story. So--there’s that. _

_ Also, for all of you who have PMed me and slyly slipped questions about “Paradise Reborn” into reviews of other stories, please know that I’m almost done. I have four chapters finished and one halfway done, which leaves one to go (maybe two, depending on. . .stuff). I just don’t want to get people’s hopes up by posting and then not being able to follow through with a completion. It’s in progress. I’ve felt guilty about it long enough. Ha. But seriously. It’s in the works. Promise.  _

_ And with that, enjoy this fluffy whatever it is. Hope you enjoy it.  _

“Can’t we just open one?” 

“No.”

“Not even ONE?” 

“Nope.”

“C’mon, Dad. You’re KILLING me!”

Jack glanced over at his son. Ben was ten, and showed every bit of it. Gangly, towheaded, freckled--legs and arms and adult teeth that were in various stages of growing in. Vala and Daniel had assured him that those foibles would all work themselves out in time, but Jack couldn’t imagine how those chompers would ever look normal without some hefty orthodontia. And the hair. Holy crap. It was like a porcupine had burrowed in there and taken up residence. He’d seen that hair before, of course. In pictures, in security footage at the SGC and the Pentagon, in the mirror. . . The difference was that Jack’s follicular havoc was a fashion statement. Ben’s was usually due to the fact that he couldn’t find a comb in the sty that was his room. 

But he digressed. 

Currently, the kid was dangling himself upside down over the topmost step of the main staircase of the O’Neills’ big old farmhouse, stretching as far as he could to try to catch a glimpse of the living room below. He’d buttoned his pajama top wrong the night before, and at some point, his bottoms had gotten turned backwards. He was still wearing socks, but they didn’t match, and one was inside out. His top had succumbed to gravity, and gathered itself near the boy’s armpits. Light from the hallway sconces made odd shadows out of Ben’s belly button, and made the pale skin of his winter-sheltered skin practically luminesce.

Jack himself was slumped down on the couch, his feet propped up on an ottoman. They were in the loft. It was one of his favorite rooms in the house, made more-so by the fact that the rest of his family usually ignored it. Situated at the top of the stairs, the room branched off on one end into a hallway that led to the kids’ and guest rooms, while double doors at the other end opened up to the room he shared with his wife. The big family TV was downstairs in the great room next to the kitchen, and that was where the kids and their friends liked to “hang” playing video games or watching movies, while Sam spent a large amount of her free time in her basement lab. Jack had an office downstairs next to the formal living room, but every time he went in there, he felt too much like The General--so he preferred to spend whatever free time he found in this loft.

“You won’t die, Ben.” This from the second child. Jordan was as graceful as Ben was awkward. They shared the same hair color, but that was there the resemblance ended. Jordan’s hair lay over her shoulder in a perfect braid, her pajamas neatly buttoned, her slippered feet tucked underneath her. She’d wandered out of her room around ten minutes after her brother had emerged, perching herself on the other end of the couch where Jack had collapsed. Only, rather than try to break the laws of physics (and spinal columns) attempting to get a glimpse of the assumed-glory that waited below, she’d reached for a book and settled in to read. 

Ben groaned, rolling his eyes as he pushed himself even further over the edge of the step. He’d hooked his foot around the bottom edge of the bookcase next to the stairwell--probably to keep himself from sliding inexorably to his death. “You can’t prove that.”

“Nobody has ever died because they had to wait for anything.”

“That’s not true.” Ben lifted his head to glare at his little sister. “That is SO not true.”

“Uh-huh.” Joey turned a page before narrowing a look towards the staircase. “It’s totally true.”

“What about medical care? Food? Water? Back-up support from the guys at your six?” Ben wrenched himself upright with the bendyness that only belonged to the young. “Waiting on any of those things will definitely kill you.”

“But we weren’t talking about back-up support or medical stuff.” Jordan raised a hand to play with the tip of her braid. “We were talking about waiting for things to happen. Like we’re waiting right now for Mom to come home.”

“But you didn’t clarify that when you made your first statement.”

“We never set parameters for the conversation, Ben.” Raising a brow in freakishly-exact similitude of her mother, Joey looked towards her father. “Did we, Daddy?”

Jack sighed heavily. These weren’t normal children. Why the hell couldn’t he have been given NORMAL children? Surely, his contribution to their DNA should have made them a little more-- _ human _ , right? Sam’s children were never going to be ‘basic’ in the first place, so he’d sort of expected gifted kids--whatever the hell that meant. But then he had to go and contribute that damned Ancient gene to the concoction. All of that mixed together had created these little sagacious monsters instead of the normal kids he’d envisioned when he’d discovered he was about to re-embark upon fatherhood. They should have come with a warning label--and a manual. 

But--again--he digressed.    


Scooting upward, Jack scrubbed at his unshaven cheek with his palm. “Why don’t you guys just figure out something else to talk about? Or--even better--find something to do.”

“We  _ have _ something to do.” Ben’s eyes flew wide, and he gesticulated wildly towards the floor below. “It’s down there. In the family room. Happens every year around this time. Big tree. Lots of stuff around it.”

“That’s not what I was talking about, and you know it.” Jack stretched a little before leaning forward and resting his elbows on his knees.

“I don’t recall you setting parameters for the conversation, either, Dad.”

“Ben.” He’d used his ‘Colonel’ voice. Only one person was immune to that voice, and she was the reason that they were all cooped up in the loft. 

“Okay, then. Like what?” Ben toppled over into a heap on the plush area rug. “There’s like--literally nothing to do up here.”

“There’s books.”

“There ARE books, Joey.” Jack couldn’t help himself. The laws of grammar must be obeyed. “And she’s right, Ben. Read a book.”

His son glanced towards the bookshelves before issuing forth a mighty groan. “I’ve read all of those books.”

“Harry Potter?” Lifting her head from her own book, Joey squinted at the rows of titles on the shelves nearest her. “You’ve never finished those.”

“That’s because Harry Potter is a gigantic whiner.”

“Is not.”

“He is, too.”

“Harry Potter is cool. He’s tragic, and a hero.” Joey laid her book in her lap and thumped it with a determined little finger. “He’s totally not a whiner.”

“He’s literally set apart from the first pages of the series as ‘Chosen’, and still he can’t figure out that he’s going to beat the bad guy.” Ben shrugged. “All he does is wander around and make excuses. Boring. Lame! You’d think he’d just pony up to the challenge and embrace his destiny, but no. He whines about it instead.”

“He’s not destined to--”

“That’s the whole point of the series, Jordan. Killing Voldemort is his destiny.”

“No.” Jordan’s braid whipped around as she shook her head--the motion a testament to her vehemence. “Harry Potter is the only one who  _ can _ , but that doesn’t mean that he’s actually capable of doing it. Or even  _ willing _ to do it.”

Ben grunted. “Foreordination versus predestination? How biblical.”

Jordan shook her head, closing the book on her lap with a sharp ‘snap’. “I can’t  _ even _ with you. Dad--can you  _ even _ with him?”

_ Could he even? _ What the hell did that mean? Jack tried to answer, but gave up halfway through, ending up offering half a shrug and an odd, strangled kind of smirk. 

Joey seemed placated by it--whatever it was. Opening her book again, she passed a knowing look between her brother and her father. “I know. Right?”

Right. Or--something. O’Neill leaned back again to slouch in his spot on the sofa. Ben had slumped onto the area rug again, only now he was arching his back by craning his neck backwards and balancing on the crown of his head. It took a few tries before he got it right, but within a few minutes, he was performing a freakishly weird kind of backbend, only without using his arms--just his head and his heels. Cautiously at first, and then more bravely, he pivoted, using his feet to propel himself in a circle with his head as the axis. 

Kids were so bendy. It was disturbing. Jack half expected him to start speaking Latin and spew green stuff. Like that kid in that movie with the priest and the house with the stairs. Except that Jack was reasonably certain that Ben wasn’t possessed. 

At least he hoped that was the case.

“Hey Dad. Can you do this?”

Jack watched as Ben finished his first circle and started his second before answering. “Nope.”

“Have you ever tried?”

“Can’t say I have.”

“Want me to teach you?”

“I’m not sure that’s a good idea.”

“Why not?” He’d gained speed in his third time around. “Do you think you’d get dizzy and puke?”

“Ooooh--gross.” Joey scrunched up her nose. “And that’s not why Dad can’t do that, Ben.”

“Then what’s the reason?” Ben paused halfway through his fourth circle. “Too old? Cuz I don’t think he’s too old.”

“Trust me, Ben. He’s too old.”

“Watch it, Squirt.” Jack turned his head to glare at his daughter. “I’m not too old. I just don’t bend like that anymore. Or  _ have _ bent like that--ever.”

“So, it’s not age, it’s flexibility.”

“Pretty much.” He twisted his wrist to glance at his watch. Seven forty-five. Sam had gotten the call just after nine the night before, which meant that she’d been gone for nearly eleven hours. Eleven long, seemingly interminable hours. “Generally, your mom and I are in great health.”

Ben flopped down and snorted out a giggle. “Generally, huh? ‘Cause you’re a General?”

“He  _ was _ a General.” Always the stickler for details, Joey muttered the correction to herself, more than anyone else. “Now, he’s retired.”

“Or maybe he’s just  _ tired _ .” Ben smiled at the ceiling, pointing towards his father with a skinny finger. “If he gets tired again, he can be  _ re _ -tired.”

Knowing where this was heading, Jack groaned.

“Is that why they call that car company ‘General Motors’? Because all the cars are ‘tired’?” Ben grinned. “Get it? Because Dad’s a General, and he’s always tired. And cars have tires, so--”

Despite herself, Jordan bit back a giggle. “So that’s why Dad is always full of hot air.”

“And why he’s always--” Ben puffed out his cheeks and stationed his teeth just right on his bottom lip--

“No.” Jack nipped that one in the bud. “No fart jokes. It’s disallowed on major holidays.”

His son scowled, his cheeks deflating. “But--if it’s true--”

Jack needed back up. But back up wasn’t here, so he went for his second best option. “Do you want me to tell Mom when she gets home?”

Resigned, Ben glared at the ceiling for a few beats before grinning again. He tilted his head back and gave his sister an upside-down look. “Hey, Jo.”

“Hmm?” She’d gone back to her book, but looked over at her brother.

“Do you know where cities keep all their for-hire vehicles?   


“No, where?”

“In taxi  _ cab _ -inets.”

Snapping her book closed again, Jordan snort-giggled. “What do you call an octopus who’s afraid of everything?”

Ben frowned for a minute before shaking his head. “What?”

“An octo- _ wuss _ .”

Ben laughed loudly as he countered. “ What do you call it when a mallard is your pediatrician?”

Joey shrugged. “What?”

“Going to the Duck-tor.” Ben snorted as he answered, causing both kids to dissolve into the giggles.

Oh, good lord. Jack reached out and grabbed the throw pillow that he’d shoved aside when he’d first sat on the couch. In some slight desperation, he covered his face with it and tried to stretch it to shield his ears, too.

It didn’t work. 

“Okay, then.” Ben turned himself upright and then sat up. “Why do doctors make good spies?”

Joey shook her head, still laughing. “Dunno. Why?”

“ Because they have  _ stealth _ -escopes.”

Tossing her book onto the couch next to her, Jordan lifted herself so that she was kneeling. “Where do religious people make their butter?”

“Where?”

“At churn-ch!” 

Ben’s turn. “What do you call a cold chameleon?”

Through her laughter, Joey shook her head and croaked a response. “I don’t know. What?”

“A Bl-lizard!”

Through his pillow, Jack heard a loud ‘thunk’. Lifting one edge, he could see Ben doubled over on the floor, his entire body shaking. Jordan was now standing on the couch, bouncing a little as she giggled. Her book lay on the floor. The source of the ‘thunk’. Jack gave the pillow enough of a shove that it landed beside him on the couch.

Hopping off the sofa, Jo struck a pose. “Which organ is the biggest joke?”

Ben thought for a moment, then shook his head. “The humerus?”

“No.” Jordan snorted. “The  _ prank _ -reas!”

Despite himself, Jack smiled. Sam would have laughed out loud at that one. He’d have to remember it to tell her later.

“Okay--a Christmas one.” Ben forced himself to stop laughing long enough to pose his next question. “What’s Santa’s favorite Mexican food?”

Eyes bright, Jordan thought briefly before shrugging. “Dunno. What?”

“Chimney-changas!”

“Hey, guys.” Jack jumped into the fray. If you can’t beat them, and all that. “How can you recognize Ronald McDonald at a nudist colony?”

Two sets of eyes--one brown, one blue, blinked at him. Blankly.

Jordan ventured forth first. “What’s a nudist colony?”

“It’s a place where people walk around naked all the time.” Ben smirked a little.

Instantly, Jordan’s nose crinkled up. “Eeeew! Why would they want to do that?”

“And why would Ronald McDonald be there?” Ben’s eyes narrowed. “That sounds kind of sketchy for a guy who sells Happy Meals.”

“Yeah. He sounds kinda sus.” Joey hopped off the couch, turning to fix a speculative look at her father. “Is he still wearing his clown makeup and wig?”

“C’mon, guys. It doesn’t matter.” O’Neill scooched himself up on the couch. “It’s a joke.”

“So, is it funny because he’s naked?”

“No--I didn’t get to the punchline yet--”

“Are you sure that you need to be telling jokes about naked people? We’re just kids, after all.”

“Who’s telling jokes about naked people?”

They’d missed her climbing the stairs. Sam stood a few steps down from the top, leaning into the loft. Her grin relayed the fact that she’d heard the last little bits of conversation. She’d left the house in civvies, but had changed into BDUs at some point during the last several hours. Her hair was pulled back into her usual chignon, anchored with a pencil and what looked like a chopstick. Whatever she’d been doing, it had gotten messy.

Jack unfolded himself from the sofa and stood. Lifting an index finger, he sought to clarify the situation. “One. One naked person. Not multiples.”

“Dad’s willingly contributing to the delinquency of minors, Mom.” Ben rolled himself upright, then rose lithely to his feet. 

“Am not.” Stepping around his youngest child, O’Neill approached the stairs. “They were telling jokes. I tried to join in.”

Sam stepped onto the penultimate stair and reached out to pat her husband gently on the cheek. “Are you sure that’s wise? Y’know. At your age and all?”

“I was just going down there to replace all their presents with lumps of coal.” Jack’s gaze winnowed at his wife. “Shall I do yours, too?”

“No!”

“Dad!”

They’d howled in unison, to which Sam laughed and reached out to gather both of them tightly to her, planting a loud kiss on each of their heads in turn. “Let me hit the head and then we’ll go downstairs.”

Jack stepped past them to start down the stairs. “I’ll go turn on the tree.”

  
  


\------------OOOOOOOO------------

“So, what was it?”

The Melee of Christmas had been over for a while. What had consumed hours in selecting, purchasing, wrapping, stuffing, and building had taken only a few minutes to unwrap, exclaim over, and set aside to unwrap more. Once the Grand Opening was over, they’d spent the rest of the day at play. Ben had settled himself at the kitchen table, surrounded by LEGO bricks and instruction manuals, and Jordan had absconded to her room--ostensibly to hang up her new clothes. Jack suspected that she’d flopped down on her bed to play the new game she’d gotten for her Switch. Something about animals and a town where you got paid to fish and hit rocks with shovels.

He’d grilled steaks for dinner, baked a few spuds. Nothing fancy. They’d spent the evening playing games with the kids--Ben had gotten an expansion pack to Catan that had made for a raucous time. Sam had soldiered through it all with a smile on her face, her excitement as palpable as the kids’ even through her obvious fatigue. As soon as the clock struck nine, though, he’d shooed Ben and Joey upstairs to get ready for bed. He hadn’t heard from them since half an hour ago, when they’d both come back downstairs for their goodnight hugs before clambering back up to their rooms.

In the meantime, he’d sent his wife upstairs for a shower while he’d lit a blaze in the fireplace in the great room. It had started to snow again, so he pulled the drapes wide and shut off most of the lights in the house. By the time his wife had finished her bath, he’d already situated himself on his favorite part of the huge sectional they’d named The Ottoman Empire, his legs stretched out on the short part of the “L”.

Sam had valiantly tried to hold back the yawns, but as soon as she’d sat down, she’d slumped over to rest her head on his shoulder. Her hair was still damp, and the wetness immediately seeped into the thick flannel of his shirt. Jack didn’t mind. In fact, he wouldn’t have moved her for the world.

RIght when he thought she’d fallen asleep, she answered his earlier query.

“Stupidity. Isn’t it usually something stupid?”

“Yeah.” Jack wriggled his arm out from beneath her and settled it around her, instead. “But there are various degrees of stupidity.”

“This was--well-- _ beyond _ stupid.” Sighing, Sam settled into his side. “Some idiot at Groom Lake decided to retro-engineer replicator blocks into robots. He was trying to create a new kind of toy for his kids. For Christmas, no less.”

“You’re kidding.”

“He’d created a couple of cars--you know, from the movie.”

“Thunder something-or-other. McGillicuddy? McBain? Mc-whatever.”

“Lightning, I think.” Sam yawned again, covering her mouth with the back of her hand. “And the truck one. Buckteeth--rust everywhere. You know the one.”

“Personally, I’ve never understood the draw.”

“They’re cute movies. Ben and Jordan liked them when they were younger.”

“Before they got so old and wise-assy?”

Sam’s shoulders shook in an exhausted sort of chuckle. “Anyway. He thought he’d disabled the actual ‘replicator’ part of the block, but nope. The stupid things broke free and started eating the facility. In the end, it was just Colonel Policek and me, blasting away kids’ cartoon characters with M-16s and a 12-gauge we pilfered from the armory.”

Jack grinned. “So, basically, it was therapeutic.”

“Ha.” Sam sank deeper into him. “Maybe just a little.”

“Well, I’m glad you got home when you did.”

“I hurried. I might have used some technology that’s technically not quite-so-approved yet in order to make that happen.” Sam tilted her face up to look at him. “But I never told you that, so you can’t be implicated.”

Jack schooled his expression into one of confusion. “Told me what?”

“Exactly.” 

She’d put on the new pajamas he’d given her, and draped a blanket over her shoulders. It was fuzzy. Fleece, or something, and softer than anything he’d felt since--well--the night before.

Which reminded him--

“Here. I think you forgot these earlier when you had to jet off to work.” Jack reached into his front pocket, twisting himself around a little for better access. “I found them when I came down to turn on the tree’s lights.”

Sam’s eyes flew wide when she saw what he was dangling from between his fingers. Silky white, the slip of fabric practically shimmered in the light radiating from the fire. “You’re kidding.”

“Actually, I’m not.” Jack dropped them into her upturned palm. “I’m just glad that I found them before the kids got downstairs.”

“I wondered where they’d gone to. I got to Groom Lake and changed from civvies to some BDUs I borrowed. There was no way I was going to borrow anyone else’s britches, so I went commando.”

“Both literally and figuratively.” Jack’s chuckle rumbled up from his chest. “There you go again, setting precedent. Before you know it, everyone’s going to be eschewing underwear.”

“Oh, I didn’t set the precedent.” Leaning away a little, Sam peered up at her husband. “Teal’c never wore underwear. He said they were too confining, and that waistbands always rubbed weirdly against his symbiote pouch. He couldn’t stand them.”

“No crap?” O’Neill’s hand stilled near Sam’s elbow. “I did not know that.”

She laid back down against his body, her breath warm against his sternum. “Vala told me that Daniel didn’t wear underwear either, when they were doing their fertility treatments.”

“Now,  _ that _ , I didn’t need to know.”

She was smiling, he could feel it. After so many years together--both before and after their wedding--she knew just which buttons to push. 

“Where were they?”

Jack grinned into the darkness. “On the tree. Like--hanging from a branch.”

“Like an ornament?” Sam’s expression blanched. “Good lord. Can you imagine?”

“Ben and Jo would probably have done a pretty good job of imagining all kinds of things if they’d seen them.”

Sam scrunched the garment in her fist, drawing the blanket up and over her, spilling its warmth over Jack’s chest. “They’re certainly a pair, aren’t they?”

“Decidedly.” Jack rubbed his hand up and down on Sam’s arm, enjoying the comfort of the fire, and the fleece, and the woman half-lying on top of him. “You should have heard them this morning. They started telling jokes that they just pulled out of the air. When I was their age, I was trying to figure out the motivations of jaywalking poultry, and here are my kids, making complex puns about scaredy-cat sea creatures and religious butter makers.”

“Tell me some. Can you remember them?”

Staring at the fire, O’Neill concentrated to get it right. “What do you call an octopus that’s afraid of everything?”

After a moment, Sam’s head moved a little against his chest. She’d given up. “What?”

“An octo-wuss.”

Her laugh was little more than a sigh. “That’s bad. Tell me another.”

“Why would doctors make good spies?”

“Dunno.”

“Because they’ve got stealth-escopes.”

His wife actually snorted at that one. “That’s actually pretty funny.”

“Right?” Jack smiled. “I was tired and grouchy this morning, or I probably would have enjoyed it more. They’re pretty great kids, when it’s all said and done.”

“I was grouchy all night, too.” Sam flattened her hand against Jack’s thigh, squeezing a bit. “Killing Thunder McCutcheon--or whatever the hell his name is--wasn’t what I had planned on doing all night.”

Jack’s answer was little more than a groan. The call had come at the most inopportune time. The kids had gone to bed a little early--willingly, even!--and the O’Neill parental units had hurriedly stuffed stockings and brought out the wrapped gifts from their hiding places to arrange under and around the tree. They’d finished more quickly than they had the year before, and efficiency must be rewarded, right? Jack had captured his bride in a long hug and tilted her head up for a congratulatory smooch.

A kiss that had lingered. That kiss had led to another, and another, until more was burning in the room than just the lights on the tree. 

But you didn’t ignore a “9-1-1” call from Groom Lake, no matter how much you wanted to. Muttering a promise to get back as soon as humanly possible, Sam had donned what she could find of what had been shed, kissed her husband hard and quick, and headed out into the cold of the night.

When he blinked, Jack could remember exactly how the tree’s lights had limned the planes and curves of her body, how the shadows had beckoned to be explored, the ivory of her skin shining nearly gold as he’d uncovered her, inch by inch. It had been glorious. Profoundly beautiful. Truly wondrous. 

They’d been married longer than they’d been team mates, now. But he’d never  _ ever _ grow tired of rediscovering her over, and over again. 

“I was thinking. On the ride home.” Her voice was little more than a husky whisper, as quiet as the snow falling outside. “All those years fighting. All the sacrifices we made. All the crap we went through.”

“I try to forget, most days.”

“I know--don’t dwell, right?” Sam went on, a little stronger. “But I was thinking that this--right now--is what we were fighting for. Those kids upstairs, and this moment, and days like today where we get to spend real time just enjoying each other. Enjoying life. This is what it was all for.”

Jack tilted his head down to press his lips against the cool, damp slickness of his wife’s hair. She was right, of course. He’d thought the same things, over the years. In those rare moments when he allowed himself to reflect. The first time he’d held Ben. The moment Jordan had smiled her first smile and Jack had realized that he was lost forever. Ben’s toothless smile when he’d mastered riding his bike. The night he’d finally gotten Ben in bed, and walked into his room to see Sam, fast asleep in his ancient recliner with a newborn Joey sleepily nuzzling at her breast. Soccer games and science fairs. Introducing his young to Super Mario Kart. Joey standing on a chair helping spoon flour into the mixer while Sam measured out brown sugar. Listening as they argued the merits of various Pokemon. All of it-- _ all of it _ \--was the reason why he’d fought.

He’d learned long ago that life was lived better in the moment, rather than grousing over the past or fretting about the future. Enjoy the now. 

_ Because sometimes, the ‘now’ was all you had.  _

He didn’t answer her with words. He pulled her even closer, instead, exulting in the strength and solidity of her body against his, relishing the smell of her shampoo, the heat of her skin, the soft whoosh of her breathing. The rhythm of her heart beating, so close to his own. Not really a reward for all those years of struggle, but a gift at the end of them. Precious. 

When you knew all that--words were superfluous. 

They sat that way for a long, long time, the crackling and popping of the logs in the fire the only sound, the only lights those of the tree, and the fire, and the moon on the snow outside. His arm was falling asleep, but he didn’t care. He was warm, and safe, and with this woman who had somehow made him whole. 

“Jack?”

This woman he’d  _ thought _ was sleeping. 

He had to clear his throat to answer her. “Yeah?”

“How  _ can _ you recognize Ronald McDonald at a nudist colony?”

“What?”

Her words were slower--and slightly slurred. Exhaustion was taking her, even as she turned up her chin to catch his eye. “You never said. I’ve been wondering all day. How  _ can _ you recognize Ronald McDonald at a nudist colony?”

Grinning at her through the night, Jack brushed a kiss on the softness of her lips and murmured the words she’d longed to hear. “He’s the one with sesame seed buns.”


End file.
